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April 29, 2005

If you are a fan of Donald Trump's show "The Apprentice" you are now aware of the fact the one must ask people what they want BEFORE promoting a product or service, or BEFORE creating a new product or service.

On two shows this season the team that failed to take the time to ask potential customers what they need and wanted from a product BEFORE executing their task FAILED MISERABLY! These two teams decided that they "knew best" about what people wanted and proceded to execute their tasks with no market research whatsoever.

Ultimately what they came up with in terms of ideas were completely off the mark and failed with the consumers.

It is amazing how many companies don't bother to do market research. The proof that such negligence is a mistake is the mountain of companies that fail each year. If you don't want to make such an error take a few minutes and go to this link and review the information (it could be a company saver :-)

------ Bob Cefail

Bob Cefail is a veteran marketing executive and author of the popular marketing blog Marketing World News at www.MarketingWorldNews.com .

April 28, 2005

Over the weekend I marveled at how bad some TV and radio commercials were. Instead of trying to sell the prospect on why something should be purchased. There was a clear attempt to either shock or entertain the watcher or listener.

One radio commercial in particular was quite gruesome. A seven year old kid was complaining about the fact that he lost his two front teeth biting into a Hardees thick burger. He stated that the burger was too large to bite and that the sourdough roll was hard. The kid then went on to state that he would rather eat at McDonalds.

First, most listeners don't want to hear about losing their teeth biting into something. Second, the commercial was virtually seeding the entire child population to McDonalds by saying "if you are seven years old McDonalds is where to go". The commercial actually said that in its script.

And finally, the commercial stated the competition's name giving free publicity to McDonalds. Just a horrible ad.

If you are going to make a TV or radio commercial or produce a print ad you must have a clear "selling" purpose. Don't get conned into producing one of those artsy ads by some creative director or graphic designer looking to win an advertising award. Your purpose should be to promote and sell the benefits of your offer. Your task is not to be an entertainer.

April 27, 2005

Where is your company going? Where are you going? If you cannot answer these two questions easily your company and /or career path could be said to be aimless.

What is aimless? It means no direction, kind of meandering down the road. Without specific aims or goals you cannot really succeed against competitors who are really "playing the game".

Look at a sports event where one team is on a mission and the other team is just playing for a paycheck. It is pretty easy to see how one of those teams is going to win the majority of the games played against the other.

In the business world you aren't just playing against one team at a time, you are playing against many teams. For marketing to really work you had better have a clear idea of where you are going and what you want to accomplish. If you don't have a clear idea, good luck. If after reading this tip you feel like you or your company are in fact aimless don't spend any more marketing dollars until you decide where you are going and what you want to acheive.